Every July, the swimming community awaits our recruiting class updates. It’s when we publish our first recruit rankings for the previous year’s freshman class (Class of 2028) and update the base times used to calculate Power Indexes (PI’s) for rising juniors and seniors.
If you’re in the Class of 2026 or 2027, expect to see changes to your PI—and possibly your ranking. We’ll explain what’s changing and why it matters. But first, a quick note for those feeling a little overwhelmed by the recruiting process....
Alright, back to the numbers that everyone’s talking about…
A More Transparent, More Accurate Formula
This year marks the most significant update to our recruit rankings formula to date. These changes aren’t a reinvention—they’re an evolution because more than 500 teams, at every level, have come to rely on Swimcloud as part of their recruiting process. That means we continually review thousands of data points and incorporate direct feedback from coaches to create a formula that’s more transparent, more accurate, and more aligned with how athletes are evaluated.
Before diving into the updates, let’s revisit a few key definitions:
Base Times - These are fundamental benchmarks for each event based on the actual NCAA Division I Championship qualifying times. These serve as a baseline against which individual performances are measured. To ensure the PI system remains current they are reviewed and adjusted annually.
Power Points - These are awarded based on an athlete's single fastest time in an event. The number of points earned is directly proportional to how close that performance comes to the corresponding national Base Time. In essence, Power Points quantify the quality and competitiveness of an athlete's best effort in each event. Want to calculate the power point for a particular swim? Here’s the formula:
Power Index: Think of this as a GPA but for swimming. It is calculated as a weighted average of your top events.
Annual Base Time Adjustments
The first change is an annual refresh of our base times. As college swimming gets faster, these benchmarks do as well. In yards, women's events got about 0.14% faster and men’s events about 0.48% faster on average. That equates to about a tenth of a second in the 100's and three-tenths in the 200's. An exception were men’s distance events which got between 0.80-1.15% faster.
In other words: the bar keeps rising. These changes ensure our system reflects the real recruiting environment. And yes—milers, we hear you. But don’t blame us—coaches told us our previous standards were too lenient.
Hello 50s of Stroke, Goodbye Sprint Factor
More than one third of of points scored at a college championship meet come from relays. As a result, like it or not, college coaches value sprinters. Fifteen years ago, we didn’t have the data to properly evaluate sprint specialists in the stroke events. To compensate, we added a sprint “bonus” that gave extra weight to swimmers who excelled in the 50 and 100 freestyle. It wasn’t ideal, but coaches said they needed a way to identify relay potential.
Fast forward to today: we now have the data, and the swim landscape has changed. So this year, we’re retiring the sprint factor and officially incorporating the 50 Back, 50 Breast, and 50 Fly into the PI calculation. While these events haven’t been added to the NCAA program, they are increasingly being contested regularly at dual meets and conference championships. More importantly, they reflect how many coaches are assessing recruits because of the impact on relays.
A New, Simpler Formula
Based on extensive feedback from college coaches and performance data across thousands of athletes, we’ve made the formula simpler, fairer, and more aligned with recruiting needs. Moving forward, your top two events will each receive full weight. Your third-best event will be weighted at 25%, and your fourth at just 2%. This change reflects what we’ve seen in the data: swimmers' third-best events are generally 13–33% slower than their second-best and increasingly fewer swimmers are scoring in three events at their conference meets. Your fourth event is included solely to break up some ties. For most swimmers it will only change their score by less than 0.02 points.
This change also means you can now calculate your own PI more easily—no bonus factors, no guessing. In fact, here it is:
Where P1 is the Power Points from your best event, P2 is your second-best, and so on. If you don’t have a third or fourth event, we’ll assign you a default score of 100 Power Points for those missing swims—meaning adding results can only improve your score.
What This Means
This updated formula is easier to understand, easier to explain, and—most importantly—better aligned with how coaches evaluate talent. Still, there are bound to be “winners” and “losers” from these changes. Don’t take it personally though. Coaches aren’t recruiting based on PI alone—but a well-structured score helps them more easily identify potential fits for their program. So let’s see how these changes will affect swimmers’ rankings and Power Indexes.
Impact on Power Indexes
For most swimmers, these adjustments will have a minimal effect.
Traditionally, when we update the base times, most swimmers see their PI get slightly larger (worse). For example, a male swimmer with a 55.50 in the 100 Breast would have earned 17.20 points under last year’s formula—but 18.56 points this year. But this year, because of the inclusion of 50s of stroke, the changes are generally smaller. In fact, many sprinters and breaststrokers saw slight improvements to their PI.
The swimmers most impacted were those with only two valid events. That’s because the new formula assigns 100 points to missing events, resulting in a 30% penalty (25% for event #3 and 5% for event #4). It’s a steep penalty, but our testing found very few swimmers fell into that category —and of those who did, most have not registered for a Swimcloud account and are less likely to be actively pursuing college swimming.
In short, if you consistently compete in three or more events, your PI is likely to remain stable—or even improve slightly.
Impact on Rankings
When it comes to rankings, some swimmers will move up while others may drop. Among the top 3,000 swimmers, 75% moved fewer than 75 spots. That might sound like a big jump, but across such a large field, it’s a relatively small shift. Even if your ranking drop significantly, don’t panic. Your times, your PI, and your Grades offer coaches better indicators to assess your potential contribution.
There were exceptions of course. The biggest “winners” were swimmers who previously lacked a solid third event. The addition of 50’s of more events meant that every swimmer had more options to choose from, but our findings showed that sprinters and breaststrokers benefited the most.
Conclusion
We know rankings are fun to follow and can be a point of pride—but they’re not a perfect science, and they don’t tell the whole story. This year’s updates reflect the evolving landscape of college swimming. With better data and input from coaches across all levels, we’ve made the formula more transparent, more relevant, and easier for swimmers and families to understand.
Yes, coaches look at Power Indexes—but they don’t recruit you because of a number. They recruit you because of your times, your grades, your work ethic, and your personality. And you should be doing the same: focusing less on where you rank, and more on finding a school and a coach where you can truly thrive.
Your PI is a tool—not a verdict. The most important part of recruiting isn’t where you stand in a ranking. It’s about finding the right environment for your academic, athletic, and personal growth.
So if you're wondering how to get recruited: be seen, be proactive, and be yourself. And if your goal is simply to improve your Power Index? That part hasn’t changed: swim faster.
FAQ’s
Why did my Power Index change?
Every July, Swimcloud updates base times to reflect faster NCAA qualifying standards and updates our formula to better align with how college coaches evaluate talent. Your Power Index likely changed due to one or both of these updates.
Why did you change the formula?
We updated the formula to better reflect how college coaches actually evaluate swimmers. Our data showed that swimmers’ third-best events are typically 13–33% weaker than their second-best, and it’s rare for athletes to qualify for NCAAs in more than two events. Coaches also told us they often focus on a swimmer’s top few events when evaluating potential. By narrowing the calculation to three (plus a tie-breaking fourth), we’re making the score both more accurate and more transparent—without penalizing versatility.
Why are the 50s of stroke included now?
We now have enough data to reliably include the 50 Fly, 50 Back, and 50 Breast. While they aren’t NCAA Championship events, they’re widely swum at dual meets and conference championships. Coaches use them to assess relay potential, so we’ve included them to reflect real recruiting practices.
If the 50s of stroke aren’t swum at NCAAs, why are you including them?
Good question. While the 50s of stroke aren’t NCAA championship events, they’re increasingly contested at dual meets and conference championships—and they’re incredibly useful for evaluating relay potential. College coaches told us these swims help them assess raw speed and stroke-specific power, especially for sprint-heavy lineups. Including them gives coaches a more complete picture of a recruit’s value and gives swimmers more ways to showcase their strengths.
Why was the 50/100 Free Sprint Bonus removed?
With the addition of stroke 50s, we no longer need a separate “sprint factor” to estimate a swimmer's speed. The new formula gives a more direct and data-driven look at a sprinter’s value.
How did you get data for the 50s of stroke?
We built the 50s of stroke into the formula only after we had enough reliable data to do it right. That data came from mining relay splits, intermediary splits (like the first 50 of a 100), and analyzing trends across thousands of performances. From there, we derived base times that fall in line with the scoring of other events.
It’s important to note: the 50s of stroke are generally harder to score well in—unless a swimmer has swum one from a flat start. That’s by design. We didn’t want to over-reward athletes who only had a fast relay split or an aggressive first 50. But if you have raced a 50 stroke from a flat start, now’s your chance to let that speed work for you.
Why did my Power Index get worse even though my times haven’t changed?
This happens because every year we update the base times—the standards your swims are compared against. As college swimming gets faster, those benchmarks get faster too. So even if your time hasn’t changed, the score it earns might.
Also, this year’s formula puts more weight on your top three events. If you’re missing a third event (or have one that’s much slower), it can have a bigger impact. In those cases, we assign a score of 100 points to missing events, which drags down your average.
The good news? Adding even one more solid swim to your profile can make a noticeable difference.
Does the club team I swim for affect my recruiting chances?
No. Swimcloud will never penalize you based on the club you swim for. Some tools try to predict college performance based on club affiliation. Every swimmer’s path is different. That’s why Swimcloud uses verified data to help you see where you stand and find the programs that are the right fit for you. We work to give every swimmer, regardless of their background, a clear view of where they fit and where they can thrive.